In 10 days it will be the 10 year anniversary of my son’s love affair with hockey and the start of a tumultuous relationship I have had with the sport.
The last 10 years have gone by so fast and I am acutely aware that my son’s youth hockey career is more than half way complete. No matter how far he goes in this sport, the time we get to completely enjoy it is limited and I want to savor every second of it and share my learnings and experiences, even if it ends up just being for myself and my son to read later.
The roller coaster we are riding is constant. One day, the experience is nothing short of delightful with team dinners and laughter-filled good times. Other days, it is a complete and utter shit-show of craziness with stress levels that should be against the law for children!
Today, I have been reminded of the craziness, once again as the Chicagoland players who are three years younger than my son, and whose parents think they are “the best of the best” of 10 year old hockey players are in the final stages of the Jr Blackhawks Brick tryouts. This event, coupled with the beginning of the “push to AAA” for the 2007 birth year players, is the craziest of time for youth hockey in Chicago…and every year it seems to go off the rails a little further!
If you are so inclined to read, I hope you get a chuckle out of some of the antics, shed a tear at some of the joy, and maybe learn from our triumphs and turbulence. At the end of the day, I hope we all look back and miss the Dekes, the Dangles, AND the Drama!
Dekes Dangles and Drama 